James Gurney

This daily weblog by Dinotopia creator James Gurney is for illustrators, plein-air painters, sketchers, comic artists, animators, art students, and writers. You'll find practical studio tips, insights into the making of the Dinotopia books, and first-hand reports from art schools and museums.

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or by email:gurneyjourney (at) gmail.comSorry, I can't give personal art advice or portfolio reviews. If you can, it's best to ask art questions in the blog comments.

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All images and text are copyright 2015 James Gurney and/or their respective owners. Dinotopia is a registered trademark of James Gurney. For use of text or images in traditional print media or for any commercial licensing rights, please email me for permission.

However, you can quote images or text without asking permission on your educational or non-commercial blog, website, or Facebook page as long as you give me credit and provide a link back. Students and teachers can also quote images or text for their non-commercial school activity. It's also OK to do an artistic copy of my paintings as a study exercise without asking permission.

17 comments:

As for the reconstructed faces, my initial reaction is that they look very odd - disquieting, even. My own portrait work has led me to believe that faces aren't normally nearly as close to symmetrical as we might tend to believe.

yeah the perfectly symmetrical faces go into that uncanny valley territory - eep. In art classes years ago, we used to look at portrait paintings and cover one half and then the other, switching back and forth so you could really see how one eye would sag a little, one ear was higher, etc.

I've seen some specials that say that "beauty" is based on symmetry...but honestly, symmetry makes things look too...robotic? I don't know, it just doesn't feel right, like the character or something has been drained from it.

Aw yeah! I tried this with my own face awhile back and even with very even lighting, it was astounding, I looked like two separate sisters.. You can see similar symmetry photos at echoism.org. Apparently people look more towards the left side of someone's face? (or something.) Lucky that my left side is more attractive than my right, haha.

PS. @BK, it might be eyelid tape rather than a drawn on crease judging by how her lids seem lifted. But it's hard to tell from the photo xD

What a great exercise! I don't think it's a manipulation at all. Her forehead looks completely normal as well as her chin area. You can see that she is wearing a striped shirt and has covered her right shoulder with another shirt over the striped shirt for effect. The asymmetry is due to the face being turned to show more of the made-up side. You can see more of her right ear, then left. Also, when the lighting is enhanced, the composites look more normal rather than the "Avatar" look where the lighting is wrong.

I can't help but comment on the question that Kim and at least one other person has raised about the authenticity of this photo demonstration.

What could the point of going to the trouble of faking such a photo? It's true that the human face - more often than not - is markedly asymmetrical. Make-up exaggerates some features and diminishes others. So clearly make-up would amplify asymmetry when applied to only one side.

As for the issue of the ears: I think it's clear that they appear different only because the shot is a few small degrees from being straight-on.

I think that faking this demo would require more time and energy than not faking it.

I think the photos were taken with different focal lengths. The width of the neck, and the with of every facial feature is different. The make up one was taken using a long focal length at a long distance, and the "clean" one was taken with a wide angle at a closer distance. At least that´s what I can speculate.